Status report for August 2009

The August report needs to be submitted by 16 August. I've
written an initial draft. Please add/fix/update/improve until Friday
15 August night (CET).

http://wiki.apache.org/xmlgraphics/StatusReports/StatusReportForMay2009

I tried to get some numbers on activity. I have come up with the
activity on the mailing lists during May, June and July, as can be
derived from the Apache archives:

fop commits: 88
batik commits: 5
xmlgraphics commits: 15 (minus deployment of the web site)
fop-dev: 311
fop-users: 610
batik-dev: 112
batik-users: 243
general: 48

Nice graphs can be seen at markmail: http://fop.markmail.org/,
http://fop-dev.markmail.org/, http://fop-user.markmail.org/,
http://batik.markmail.org/, http://batik-dev.markmail.org/,
http://batik-user.markmail.org/,
http://xmlgraphics.markmail.org/search/?q=#query:list%3Aorg.apache.xmlgraphics.general+page:1+state:facets

Regards, Simon

--
Simon Pepping
home page: http://www.leverkruid.eu

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscribe@...
For additional commands, e-mail: general-help@...

The link must be:
http://wiki.apache.org/xmlgraphics/StatusReports/StatusReportForAugust2009

Simon

On Tue, Aug 04, 2009 at 09:42:13PM +0200, Simon Pepping wrote:

> The August report needs to be submitted by 16 August. I've
> written an initial draft. Please add/fix/update/improve until Friday
> 15 August night (CET).
>
> http://wiki.apache.org/xmlgraphics/StatusReports/StatusReportForMay2009
>
> I tried to get some numbers on activity. I have come up with the
> activity on the mailing lists during May, June and July, as can be
> derived from the Apache archives:
>
> fop commits: 88
> batik commits: 5
> xmlgraphics commits: 15 (minus deployment of the web site)
> fop-dev: 311
> fop-users: 610
> batik-dev: 112
> batik-users: 243
> general: 48
>
> Nice graphs can be seen at markmail: http://fop.markmail.org/,
> http://fop-dev.markmail.org/, http://fop-user.markmail.org/,
> http://batik.markmail.org/, http://batik-dev.markmail.org/,
> http://batik-user.markmail.org/,
> http://xmlgraphics.markmail.org/search/?q=#query:list%3Aorg.apache.xmlgraphics.general+page:1+state:facets
>
> Regards, Simon
>
> --
> Simon Pepping
> home page: http://www.leverkruid.eu
>
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscribe@...
> For additional commands, e-mail: general-help@...
>

--
Simon Pepping
home page: http://www.leverkruid.eu

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscribe@...
For additional commands, e-mail: general-help@...

[Vincent Hennebert-2]

Hi Simon,

The report looks good. Just a thing about the ChangingIPD hack: actually
it is still undecided whether it should be merged back to Trunk or not.

My main concern about that is that it will get in the way when
implementing the new approach. I will basically have to start with
reverting all the changes made for the hack.

My idea was to actively maintain the branch in sync with the Trunk.
Releases could then be made from the branch. But this may actually turn
out to be more work than reverting all the changes in one go. Plus it
has been mentioned to me that this may create difficulties for users who
regularly take snapshots of the Trunk (the branch will always lag
a little bit behind).

Any opinion about this is welcome. Meanwhile, I’ll modify the status
report.

Thanks,
Vincent


Simon Pepping wrote:

> The August report needs to be submitted by 16 August. I've
> written an initial draft. Please add/fix/update/improve until Friday
> 15 August night (CET).
>
> http://wiki.apache.org/xmlgraphics/StatusReports/StatusReportForMay2009
>
> I tried to get some numbers on activity. I have come up with the
> activity on the mailing lists during May, June and July, as can be
> derived from the Apache archives:
>
> fop commits: 88
> batik commits: 5
> xmlgraphics commits: 15 (minus deployment of the web site)
> fop-dev: 311
> fop-users: 610
> batik-dev: 112
> batik-users: 243
> general: 48
>
> Nice graphs can be seen at markmail: http://fop.markmail.org/,
> http://fop-dev.markmail.org/, http://fop-user.markmail.org/,
> http://batik.markmail.org/, http://batik-dev.markmail.org/,
> http://batik-user.markmail.org/,
> http://xmlgraphics.markmail.org/search/?q=#query:list%3Aorg.apache.xmlgraphics.general+page:1+state:facets
>
> Regards, Simon
>

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscribe@...
For additional commands, e-mail: general-help@...

[cbowditch]

Vincent Hennebert wrote:
> Hi Simon,

Hi Simon, Vincent,

>
> The report looks good. Just a thing about the ChangingIPD hack: actually
> it is still undecided whether it should be merged back to Trunk or not.
>
> My main concern about that is that it will get in the way when
> implementing the new approach. I will basically have to start with
> reverting all the changes made for the hack.
>
> My idea was to actively maintain the branch in sync with the Trunk.
> Releases could then be made from the branch. But this may actually turn
> out to be more work than reverting all the changes in one go. Plus it
> has been mentioned to me that this may create difficulties for users who
> regularly take snapshots of the Trunk (the branch will always lag
> a little bit behind).
>
> Any opinion about this is welcome. Meanwhile, I’ll modify the status
> report.

Thanks for bringing this up Vincent. I am a little reluctant to be
working off a branch as we regularly take build snapshots from trunk.
This creates a lot of extra work keeping the branch in sync.

I think we all acknowledge that the changing IPD hack is just that and
therefore code quality may be sub optimal. However, since Vincent is
working on a totally new layout engine then we expect this code to be
replaced a year or so down the line anyway. Therefore if the only reason
for not putting this change into trunk is to save effort at the point
when the new layout algorithm is introduced then I think this hack
should be merged with trunk. This is because it will be more time
consuming to do a 100 or so merges over a 1-2 year period than to remove
changes from trunk in a one time exercise.

Thanks,

Chris

>
> Thanks,
> Vincent
>
>
> Simon Pepping wrote:
>
>>The August report needs to be submitted by 16 August. I've
>>written an initial draft. Please add/fix/update/improve until Friday
>>15 August night (CET).
>>
>>http://wiki.apache.org/xmlgraphics/StatusReports/StatusReportForMay2009
>>
>>I tried to get some numbers on activity. I have come up with the
>>activity on the mailing lists during May, June and July, as can be
>>derived from the Apache archives:
>>
>>fop commits: 88
>>batik commits: 5
>>xmlgraphics commits: 15 (minus deployment of the web site)
>>fop-dev: 311
>>fop-users: 610
>>batik-dev: 112
>>batik-users: 243
>>general: 48
>>
>>Nice graphs can be seen at markmail: http://fop.markmail.org/,
>>http://fop-dev.markmail.org/, http://fop-user.markmail.org/,
>>http://batik.markmail.org/, http://batik-dev.markmail.org/,
>>http://batik-user.markmail.org/,
>>http://xmlgraphics.markmail.org/search/?q=#query:list%3Aorg.apache.xmlgraphics.general+page:1+state:facets
>>
>>Regards, Simon
>>
>
>
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscribe@...
> For additional commands, e-mail: general-help@...
>
>
>

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscribe@...
For additional commands, e-mail: general-help@...

[Jeremias Maerki-2]

On 04.08.2009 21:42:13 Simon Pepping wrote:

> The August report needs to be submitted by 16 August. I've
> written an initial draft. Please add/fix/update/improve until Friday
> 15 August night (CET).
>
> http://wiki.apache.org/xmlgraphics/StatusReports/StatusReportForMay2009
>
> I tried to get some numbers on activity. I have come up with the
> activity on the mailing lists during May, June and July, as can be
> derived from the Apache archives:
>
> fop commits: 88
> batik commits: 5
> xmlgraphics commits: 15 (minus deployment of the web site)
> fop-dev: 311
> fop-users: 610
> batik-dev: 112
> batik-users: 243
> general: 48
>
> Nice graphs can be seen at markmail: http://fop.markmail.org/,
> http://fop-dev.markmail.org/, http://fop-user.markmail.org/,
> http://batik.markmail.org/, http://batik-dev.markmail.org/,
> http://batik-user.markmail.org/,
> http://xmlgraphics.markmail.org/search/?q=#query:list%3Aorg.apache.xmlgraphics.general+page:1+state:facets

Other interesting statistics:
http://www.svnsearch.org/svnsearch/repos/ASF/search?from=20090101&to=20091231&path=%2Fxmlgraphics%2Fbatik
http://www.svnsearch.org/svnsearch/repos/ASF/search?from=20090101&to=20091231&path=%2Fxmlgraphics%2Ffop
http://www.svnsearch.org/svnsearch/repos/ASF/search?from=20090101&to=20091231&path=%2Fxmlgraphics%2Fcommons

Generally, the (updated) report sounds fine.

One thing that concerns me a bit is the growing patch queue in Batik and
FOP.

Batik Patch Queue:
https://issues.apache.org/bugzilla/buglist.cgi?bug_status=NEW&bug_status=ASSIGNED&bug_status=REOPENED&bug_status=NEEDINFO&product=Batik&query_format=advanced&short_desc=[PATCH]&short_desc_type=allwordssubstr&order=bug_id
FOP Patch Queue:
https://issues.apache.org/bugzilla/buglist.cgi?bug_status=NEW&bug_status=ASSIGNED&bug_status=REOPENED&bug_status=NEEDINFO&product=Fop&query_format=advanced&short_desc=[PATCH]&short_desc_type=allwordssubstr&order=bug_id

Good patches that don't get processed will drive potential committers
away at some point. And patches can go out of date. But I still have no
recipe to get our project more active. I've been trying to recruit FOP
users to participate in the development ever since I went independent,
with only little success. Some people are often happier to pay for a
little extension or fix (which made a good part of my income in the last
few years) than to dive in themselves and take more control. And most
simply expect others to work for them for free. And then there's the
problem that spare fun time to do things not work/client-related is
usually very limited. Sigh.


Jeremias Maerki


---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscribe@...
For additional commands, e-mail: general-help@...

On Fri, Aug 07, 2009 at 09:59:42PM +0200, Jeremias Maerki wrote:
>
> Other interesting statistics:
... snip ...
Thanks for the links.

> Generally, the (updated) report sounds fine.
>
> One thing that concerns me a bit is the growing patch queue in Batik and
> FOP.
>
... snip ...

>
> Good patches that don't get processed will drive potential committers
> away at some point. And patches can go out of date. But I still have no
> recipe to get our project more active. I've been trying to recruit FOP
> users to participate in the development ever since I went independent,
> with only little success. Some people are often happier to pay for a
> little extension or fix (which made a good part of my income in the last
> few years) than to dive in themselves and take more control. And most
> simply expect others to work for them for free. And then there's the
> problem that spare fun time to do things not work/client-related is
> usually very limited. Sigh.

I agree. Do you want this concern included in the report? I prefer to
give a realistic view of the project's position. Therefore at some
point such concerns need to be expressed. Is that already in this
report?

Simon

--
Simon Pepping
home page: http://www.leverkruid.eu

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscribe@...
For additional commands, e-mail: general-help@...

[Jeremias Maerki-2]

On 07.08.2009 22:09:01 Simon Pepping wrote:

> On Fri, Aug 07, 2009 at 09:59:42PM +0200, Jeremias Maerki wrote:
> >
> > Other interesting statistics:
> ... snip ...
> Thanks for the links.
>
> > Generally, the (updated) report sounds fine.
> >
> > One thing that concerns me a bit is the growing patch queue in Batik and
> > FOP.
> >
> ... snip ...
> >
> > Good patches that don't get processed will drive potential committers
> > away at some point. And patches can go out of date. But I still have no
> > recipe to get our project more active. I've been trying to recruit FOP
> > users to participate in the development ever since I went independent,
> > with only little success. Some people are often happier to pay for a
> > little extension or fix (which made a good part of my income in the last
> > few years) than to dive in themselves and take more control. And most
> > simply expect others to work for them for free. And then there's the
> > problem that spare fun time to do things not work/client-related is
> > usually very limited. Sigh.
>
> I agree. Do you want this concern included in the report? I prefer to
> give a realistic view of the project's position. Therefore at some
> point such concerns need to be expressed. Is that already in this
> report?

I guess it is. Probably just me venting frustration. The board knows
since the forming of the XML Graphics project that Batik has not many
active people. It has 3 active committers. That's been the same since
2005 although the activity has quieted down in the last 3-4 months. I
just fear a serious problem for Batik if one of the three went away. FOP
has 7 active committers in 2009 so is in a more comfortable position.
Maybe you can add those numbers just to have stated that once in a while.
After all, the board members change, too. OTOH, if the board sees that
some activity is happening and oversight is there, they have no problem
with us.

Still, the general problem is the same for the whole project: so many
users, so few contributors. We just have to make sure we don't forget to
turn recurring contributors into committers.



Jeremias Maerki


---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscribe@...
For additional commands, e-mail: general-help@...

On Fri, Aug 07, 2009 at 11:00:48PM +0200, Jeremias Maerki wrote:

> On 07.08.2009 22:09:01 Simon Pepping wrote:
> > On Fri, Aug 07, 2009 at 09:59:42PM +0200, Jeremias Maerki wrote:
> > >
> > > Other interesting statistics:
> > ... snip ...
> > Thanks for the links.
> >
> > > Generally, the (updated) report sounds fine.
> > >
> > > One thing that concerns me a bit is the growing patch queue in Batik and
> > > FOP.
> > >
> > ... snip ...
> > >
> > > Good patches that don't get processed will drive potential committers
> > > away at some point. And patches can go out of date. But I still have no
> > > recipe to get our project more active. I've been trying to recruit FOP
> > > users to participate in the development ever since I went independent,
> > > with only little success. Some people are often happier to pay for a
> > > little extension or fix (which made a good part of my income in the last
> > > few years) than to dive in themselves and take more control. And most
> > > simply expect others to work for them for free. And then there's the
> > > problem that spare fun time to do things not work/client-related is
> > > usually very limited. Sigh.
> >
> > I agree. Do you want this concern included in the report? I prefer to
> > give a realistic view of the project's position. Therefore at some
> > point such concerns need to be expressed. Is that already in this
> > report?
>
> I guess it is. Probably just me venting frustration. The board knows
> since the forming of the XML Graphics project that Batik has not many
> active people. It has 3 active committers. That's been the same since
> 2005 although the activity has quieted down in the last 3-4 months. I
> just fear a serious problem for Batik if one of the three went away. FOP
> has 7 active committers in 2009 so is in a more comfortable position.
> Maybe you can add those numbers just to have stated that once in a while.
> After all, the board members change, too. OTOH, if the board sees that
> some activity is happening and oversight is there, they have no problem
> with us.

It is something we should be aware of ourselves. Let us include in
this report a reflection on the long-term situation, with the above
concerns about the patch queues and the number of active
committers. It is good to include such considerations at least once a
year. If Jeremias or someone else does not do it earlier, I will give
it a try Monday evening.
 
> Still, the general problem is the same for the whole project: so many
> users, so few contributors. We just have to make sure we don't forget to
> turn recurring contributors into committers.

I noted two more active contributors on the FOP list, and one very
active contributor on the Batik list.

Simon

--
Simon Pepping
home page: http://www.leverkruid.eu

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscribe@...
For additional commands, e-mail: general-help@...

[Jeremias Maerki-2]

On 09.08.2009 10:58:07 Simon Pepping wrote:

> On Fri, Aug 07, 2009 at 11:00:48PM +0200, Jeremias Maerki wrote:
> > On 07.08.2009 22:09:01 Simon Pepping wrote:
> > > On Fri, Aug 07, 2009 at 09:59:42PM +0200, Jeremias Maerki wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Other interesting statistics:
> > > ... snip ...
> > > Thanks for the links.
> > >
> > > > Generally, the (updated) report sounds fine.
> > > >
> > > > One thing that concerns me a bit is the growing patch queue in Batik and
> > > > FOP.
> > > >
> > > ... snip ...
> > > >
> > > > Good patches that don't get processed will drive potential committers
> > > > away at some point. And patches can go out of date. But I still have no
> > > > recipe to get our project more active. I've been trying to recruit FOP
> > > > users to participate in the development ever since I went independent,
> > > > with only little success. Some people are often happier to pay for a
> > > > little extension or fix (which made a good part of my income in the last
> > > > few years) than to dive in themselves and take more control. And most
> > > > simply expect others to work for them for free. And then there's the
> > > > problem that spare fun time to do things not work/client-related is
> > > > usually very limited. Sigh.
> > >
> > > I agree. Do you want this concern included in the report? I prefer to
> > > give a realistic view of the project's position. Therefore at some
> > > point such concerns need to be expressed. Is that already in this
> > > report?
> >
> > I guess it is. Probably just me venting frustration. The board knows
> > since the forming of the XML Graphics project that Batik has not many
> > active people. It has 3 active committers. That's been the same since
> > 2005 although the activity has quieted down in the last 3-4 months. I
> > just fear a serious problem for Batik if one of the three went away. FOP
> > has 7 active committers in 2009 so is in a more comfortable position.
> > Maybe you can add those numbers just to have stated that once in a while.
> > After all, the board members change, too. OTOH, if the board sees that
> > some activity is happening and oversight is there, they have no problem
> > with us.
>
> It is something we should be aware of ourselves. Let us include in
> this report a reflection on the long-term situation, with the above
> concerns about the patch queues and the number of active
> committers. It is good to include such considerations at least once a
> year. If Jeremias or someone else does not do it earlier, I will give
> it a try Monday evening.

How about (under the general comments section):

The XML Graphics project is one of those projects which don't profit
from any hype topics to attract many new contributors but have a lot of
users. Batik and FOP have been around since 1999 (note the 10-year
anniversary later this year). So far in 2009, 3 committers are active on
the Batik codebase, 7 on FOP codebase. In the case of Batik these 3 are
the same since 2005. No additions, but so far luckily no drop-offs.

We're a little concerned (but not alarmed, yet) that a slightly growing
number of patches don't get processed in reasonable time. Also, we have
to get better at turning regular contributors into committers.

> > Still, the general problem is the same for the whole project: so many
> > users, so few contributors. We just have to make sure we don't forget to
> > turn recurring contributors into committers.
>
> I noted two more active contributors on the FOP list, and one very
> active contributor on the Batik list.

Right. We need to get a little more active on that front.

Maybe we also have to revisit our rule (from back when XML Graphics was
formed) that FOP committers shouldn't mess around in Batik's repository
and vice-versa. We have separate committer sets today (although these
are likely to be merged automatically when the LDAP authentication goes
live for Subversion access). The subprojects might be able to help each
other out especially when a contributor has already invested a lot of
time reviewing patches.

Some other random ideas:
- Plan an XML Graphics get-together (2-3 days) of intensive discussion,
patch processing, other hacking and eating and drinking. If there's
enough interest (min. 4-5 people, committers and contributors welcome),
I'm certain I can put something together here in Lucerne.
- Plan virtual XML Graphics days (2 or 3 times a year) where we hook
together for a few hours to go over patches and other high-priority
issues.

Jeremias Maerki


---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscribe@...
For additional commands, e-mail: general-help@...

On Sun, Aug 09, 2009 at 11:44:00AM +0200, Jeremias Maerki wrote:

> How about (under the general comments section):
>
> The XML Graphics project is one of those projects which don't profit
> from any hype topics to attract many new contributors but have a lot of
> users. Batik and FOP have been around since 1999 (note the 10-year
> anniversary later this year). So far in 2009, 3 committers are active on
> the Batik codebase, 7 on FOP codebase. In the case of Batik these 3 are
> the same since 2005. No additions, but so far luckily no drop-offs.
>
> We're a little concerned (but not alarmed, yet) that a slightly growing
> number of patches don't get processed in reasonable time. Also, we have
> to get better at turning regular contributors into committers.

I added this with a rephrasing of the first sentence, some language
corrections, and a move of one sentence.

Simon

--

Simon Pepping

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscribe@...
For additional commands, e-mail: general-help@...

On Sun, Aug 09, 2009 at 11:44:00AM +0200, Jeremias Maerki wrote:
> Maybe we also have to revisit our rule (from back when XML Graphics was
> formed) that FOP committers shouldn't mess around in Batik's repository
> and vice-versa. We have separate committer sets today (although these
> are likely to be merged automatically when the LDAP authentication goes
> live for Subversion access). The subprojects might be able to help each
> other out especially when a contributor has already invested a lot of
> time reviewing patches.

Who else than you is familiar enough with Batiks's code base, or at
least some parts of it, to review and commit patches?

> Some other random ideas:
> - Plan an XML Graphics get-together (2-3 days) of intensive discussion,
> patch processing, other hacking and eating and drinking. If there's
> enough interest (min. 4-5 people, committers and contributors welcome),
> I'm certain I can put something together here in Lucerne.
> - Plan virtual XML Graphics days (2 or 3 times a year) where we hook
> together for a few hours to go over patches and other high-priority
> issues.

These plans sound good. Contact may invigorate a team. From the
ApacheCon hackatons I know that it can be inspirational to work
together. NW-Europe is indeed a reasonable place for most people. The
virtual plan is more easily achieved.

Simon

--
Simon Pepping
home page: http://www.leverkruid.eu

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscribe@...
For additional commands, e-mail: general-help@...

Report submitted as it is on the wiki in
StatusReports/StatusReportForAugust2009.

Simon

On Tue, Aug 04, 2009 at 09:42:13PM +0200, Simon Pepping wrote:

> The August report needs to be submitted by 16 August. I've
> written an initial draft. Please add/fix/update/improve until Friday
> 15 August night (CET).
>
> http://wiki.apache.org/xmlgraphics/StatusReports/StatusReportForMay2009
>
> I tried to get some numbers on activity. I have come up with the
> activity on the mailing lists during May, June and July, as can be
> derived from the Apache archives:
>
> fop commits: 88
> batik commits: 5
> xmlgraphics commits: 15 (minus deployment of the web site)
> fop-dev: 311
> fop-users: 610
> batik-dev: 112
> batik-users: 243
> general: 48
>
> Nice graphs can be seen at markmail: http://fop.markmail.org/,
> http://fop-dev.markmail.org/, http://fop-user.markmail.org/,
> http://batik.markmail.org/, http://batik-dev.markmail.org/,
> http://batik-user.markmail.org/,
> http://xmlgraphics.markmail.org/search/?q=#query:list%3Aorg.apache.xmlgraphics.general+page:1+state:facets

--
Simon Pepping
home page: http://www.leverkruid.eu

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscribe@...
For additional commands, e-mail: general-help@...